SAP BTP Build · Vendor Management · Clean Core on S/4HANA
Energy and Utilities SAP BTP SAP Build Process Automation SAP Build Work Zone Featured
How Merit Energy replaced a legacy vendor system with a BTP-built portal that cut approval clicks by 60%
Delivered 2025
Mindset replaced Merit Energy's legacy Java-based vendor system with a BTP-native Vendor Management Portal that cut approval clicks by 60%, saved each user 57 hours a year, and went from design to full employee rollout.
By the numbers
-
Fewer clicks per approval task
-
57 hrs/user/yr
Saved per user annually
-
$113.5K /yr
Estimated annual savings across 60 users
-
~20 weeks
Design through go-live
Before
A legacy Java VMS with no SAP integration
- Vendor approvals ran in a linear queue through a Java-based system that did not connect to SAP S/4HANA or MDG.
- No central dashboard, so stakeholders tracked status by email and manual follow-up.
- Safety and insurance data required separate manual lookups in ISN, adding steps for every vendor review.
After
A unified BTP portal, built on Merit's own SAP investment
- Build Work Zone Advanced Edition federating S/4 and MDG apps into one role-aware workspace, with parallel approval workflows replacing the linear queue.
- Automated notifications, My Inbox task management, and real-time status visible to every stakeholder without sending an email.
- ISN safety data and MDG vendor master both integrated into the portal, with Datasphere CDS views available for analytics.
Why this matters
Merit Energy had already bet on SAP BTP. The question was whether it could replace a working, legacy Java system with something better on that platform. The answer came back with 60% fewer clicks and 57 hours saved per user per year.
The challenge
Merit Energy is one of the largest private oil and gas operators in the US, managing upstream production on behalf of institutional investors and family offices. Its vendor management team, spanning Field Admins, Safety Managers, Treasury Analysts, AP Accountants, and Associate General Counsel, ran a legacy Java-based Vendor Management System that had no integration with SAP. There was no central dashboard, no real-time visibility into where an approval stood, and no way to run parallel reviews. Everything defaulted to email.
Approvers worked in silos. Requests moved one at a time through a linear queue, so a delay anywhere stopped the whole chain. The team spent more time chasing status updates than managing vendors, and deadlines slipped under the weight of manual follow-ups.
Merit had already committed to SAP BTP, S/4HANA, and MDG. The ask was to build something on that investment, not bolt on another point solution.
What we did
Mindset started with a Design Thinking workshop, working through the vendor management process with the actual stakeholders before writing a line of code. That work surfaced the real shape of the problem: a need for parallel, non-linear approvals, not just a cleaner UI on top of the same linear flow.
From there, the team configured SAP Build Work Zone Advanced Edition as the central hub, federated S/4 and MDG apps into a unified experience, and built UI5 task forms to handle the approval interactions. SAP Build Process Automation drove the workflow engine, with API triggers, a My Inbox view for approvers, automated email notifications for assignments, approvals, and rejections, and job scheduling. Role and group security ran through IAS and BTP. CI/CD moved to Azure DevOps.
The data layer got attention too. MDG-to-Datasphere CDS views gave analysts access to vendor master data for reporting. An ISN ETL integration pulled safety and insurance certificate data directly into the portal, eliminating a manual lookup step for Safety Managers.
Delivery ran on two-week Scrum sprints. The portal went live in January 2025, and Mindset rolled it out to all Merit employees by April 2025.
The outcomes
The Vendor Management Portal replaced email chains and a disconnected legacy system with a single, role-aware workspace. Approval tasks now run in parallel, notifications fire automatically, and every stakeholder can see where a request stands without sending a message.
The published results: 60% fewer clicks per approval task, 57 hours saved per user per year, and roughly $113.5K in annual savings across 60 users. Those numbers come from the public Mindset case study and reflect the portal as deployed in production.
Merit's team also came out of the project with working knowledge of BTP services and low-code development, which matters for what comes next. Mindset continued with a Datasphere and SAC reporting advisory, Integration Suite advisory and a proof of concept for ISN-to-S/4, and ongoing application managed services through 2026.
If we built this today
Concept · not delivered scopeVendor approvals that route themselves.
This is a forward-looking concept, not the scope we delivered on this engagement. It is the build we would reach for now, grounded in SAP that ships today.
The portal already cut approval clicks by 60 percent by killing the legacy linear workflow, and a vendor approval agent is the next step: it watches the parallel approvals, drafts each approver's tasks, and surfaces who is about to miss a deadline.
The data product
Supplier / Vendor Master data product
A governed vendor and supplier dataset spanning MDG and S/4HANA, so the agent reasons over one trusted view of vendor status, compliance flags, and approval history instead of a legacy system that never talked to SAP.
Data product on SAP Business Data Cloud
The Joule agent
Vendor Approval Routing Agent
Reads the open vendor onboarding and change requests across MDG, the approval policy, and each approver's queue, then proposes the right parallel routing, drafts the My Inbox tasks, and flags who is blocking a deadline so nobody chases status over email.
SAP Build Process Automation, SAP MDG, SAP Build Work Zone, SAP BTP · PROPOSE · Approval cycle time and clicks per approval task
The Fiori app
My Inbox (Joule-embedded approvals)
The standard My Inbox approvals app with Joule riding along, so a Field Admin, Treasury Analyst, or counsel can ask what is waiting, why it matters, and approve or send it back without hunting through linear steps.
Embedded in the Fiori launchpad
We would mine the real vendor approval flow in SAP Signavio first, map the BTP and MDG estate in SAP LeanIX, and let MIND accelerators carry the existing Build Process Automation work into the agent build rather than starting over.
What we built
-
Full employee rollout in April 2025, three months after go-live
Vendor Management Portal on SAP BTP
A unified work center built on Build Work Zone Advanced Edition, federating S/4HANA and MDG apps with UI5 task forms for vendor onboarding and approval workflows.
-
60% fewer clicks per approval task
Non-linear parallel approval workflows
SAP Build Process Automation driving multi-party, parallel approval flows with API triggers, My Inbox for approvers, and automated email notifications for every state change.
-
One workspace replacing multiple disconnected tools
MDG and S/4HANA app federation
S/4HANA and MDG Fiori apps federated into a single Build Work Zone, with role and group security configured in IAS and BTP.
-
Vendor master data available for analytics in Datasphere
MDG-to-Datasphere CDS views
Vendor master data published from MDG into Datasphere via CDS views, giving analysts direct access for reporting without manual exports.
-
ISN safety and insurance data integrated into portal
ISN ETL integration
Safety and insurance certificate data pulled from ISN directly into the VMP, eliminating a manual lookup step for Safety Managers and Associate General Counsel.
-
Governed promotion across all environments
Azure DevOps CI/CD pipeline
CI/CD moved from ad-hoc deployment to Azure DevOps, enabling governed transport and repeatable delivery across dev, test, and production environments.
-
Legacy custom app retired, clean core architecture in place
Clean Core Fiori apps on S/4HANA
Replaced a legacy custom journal entry application with role-based Fiori apps built to clean core standards, co-presented with Merit Energy's Jordan Fitzsimmons at ASUG Americas 2024.
-
Internal team capable on BTP services post-delivery
BTP enablement and team upskilling
Hands-on delivery structured to leave Merit's internal team with working knowledge of Build Work Zone, Build Process Automation, and BTP low-code tooling.
A look at the work
Presented publicly
We took this work to the SAP stage.
To protect its S/4HANA investment, Merit replaced a legacy journal-entry application with clean-core Fiori apps and standard workflows. Submit, verify, post, all on standard. The design came out of an AppHaus Design Thinking workshop.
